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Over the day that followed being saved by what was clearly Nakamura in cosplay(?), Hirose came to some new realizations.
One-Nakamura was much more closed off. The little progress he’d made over the previous year in terms of socialization seemed to have been reversed. His quiet conversations with Kawamura had completely stopped, he would avoid speaking unless directly called upon in class, and unless it was Hirose doing the approaching, wouldn’t acknowledge anyone who tried to start a conversation with him.
Two-Nakamura seemed a lot more catlike than before. Hirose’s leading theory was some sort of psychosis tied to whatever had possessed him to don cat themed cosplay and fight actual nightmares. Nightmares plural, because no way was the encounter from the parking garage the first time the taller boy had dealt with a monster like that. Nakamura’s bravery against anything supernatural could not possibly extend to a creature so grotesque, Hirose doubted anyone had that sort of courage. It wouldn’t be that big of a leap in logic to think multiple encounters with creatures like that had broken something fundamental in his best friend.
After all, no sane person would convincingly purr over being gifted Takoyaki during lunch.
“You’re a saint, Hirose” Nakamura spoke through the sound, happily accepting the warm box the chestnut haired boy had to sneak off campus in the middle of their previous class to get fresh. Hirose ignored the bizarre little skip his heart did at the sight of the taller boys grateful expression, as there were more pressing matters he was still concerning himself with.
The two boys were currently enjoying their lunch period alone on the school roof, a secluded place Nakamura had shared a few weeks back, the first time they did this. It had become almost commonplace since then, so Nakamura hadn’t been suspicious when Hirose suggested they eat up here again today. Only a minor part of Aiki’s motive was to give the taller boy a fresh box of his favorite treat in private. The gift wasn’t meant for bribing purposes, if anything Nakmaura deserved something way nicer for saving the Hirose’s life yesterday, takoyaki just happened to be the only thing the brunette could get for him on short notice. Any contribution the gift could give in terms of getting Nakamura to let a proverbial cat out of the bag would be completely unintentional.
Yup! Nothing nefarious going on here, no sir.
Hirose took a moment to figure out how to properly approach the whole “thank you for saving my life, but also what the hell have you been doing after school???” as both teens unpacked their respective lunches and said quiet grace. There really weren’t many options to start the conversation that wouldn’t make Aiki sound positively insane if he was wrong about what he’d experienced yesterday-weird sound or no. Nakamura wasn’t acting like anything of note happened at all!
Aiki suppressed a frustrated huff, and looked back over at the boy seated next to him. Just like usual, he was keeping quiet, staring out at the city skyline, waiting for Hirose to start their lunch conversation. A soft breeze tugged at the dark fringe that partially obscured his sharp eyes, but Nakamura’s expression revealed nothing. Just silent, contemplative intensity undercut by the purr-like sound still rumbling through the air.
It wasn’t until Nakamura brought the first ball of takoyaki up to his mouth that Hirose finally clocked something undeniably different. The canines that peeked from under Nakamura’s lips were long and sharp, with shorter, equally sharp bicuspids (thank you recent biology class) behind them, only visible for a split moment before the taller boy bit down on his treat. As he pulled the toothpick out and chewed, the purring got loud again. It almost seemed like Nakamura wasn’t registering he was making such noises at all….
Nakamura can’t actually be part cat, right? I should have noticed by now if he was… Aiki tried to reason, but the purring was getting very hard to ignore. If it even was purring-maybe there was a groundskeeper nearby doing work? With… strange timing? No, that sound is definitely coming from him…
“Eh? H-Hirose!?” Nakamura squeaked, and oh, he hadn’t registered his knuckles were against the other boys neck. The purring hadn’t stopped, and the taller boys throat was still rumbling in sync with the sound. Realizing he probably had limited time before Nakamura flipped out and flinched away like he usually did when touched, Hirose chose to lift his hand up further and wipe his thumb across the other boys cheek. There had been stripes yesterday, but his thumb drew away neither makeup or face paint residue.
…Two out of three so far in favor of yesterday being a thing that actually happened. Plus, maybe one for one on his emerging theory that Nakamura might be part cat now. Which, if so, Hirose was a terrible friend for not noticing when something that drastic changed-
“W-w-what are you doing!?” Nakamura seemed to finally reach his limit. Hirose watched with amusement as his refined looking friend screeched and jerked back like the physical contact had burned him. Pale cheeks had been overwhelmed by the bright red blush blooming across Nakamura’s face, and for a brief moment, Aiki found himself distracted by the pretty color.
“You had something on your face” the brunette lied calmly, waving his hand like it could clear away Nakamura’s… embarrassment? To be honest, Hirose occasionally had trouble reading his best friends’ expressions, a flaw he’d been trying his best to correct since the day he gave the taller boy that octopus keychain. “Just thought I’d wipe it off myself with how distracted you seemed”
“O-oh. Sorry, that’s very kind of you” Nakamura apologized quietly, the purring getting louder as his face lightened a few shades. Hirose knew it was rude to stare, but he couldn’t seem to help it today. Thankfully, his friend was still too nervous to look back and catch him doing so. “Y-y-you can just tell me next time”
“Mmm” Aiki responded noncommittally, finally tearing his eyes away from Nakamura to give the shy boy some reprieve. While his companion settled back down and resumed eating, Hirose picked at his own lunch, finalizing his plan of action. Something needed to be said about the incident before they had to go back inside. “…. Why did you lie to me yesterday?”
Nakamura choked on whatever non-takoyaki part of his bento was currently in his mouth.
“W-what do you mean?” The anxious boy asked after swallowing down the troublesome bite. If Hirose looked real close he could see a tiny bit of one of his fangs poking out over his bottom lip. Not that the observation was in any way important…
“Don’t play dumb, you lied to my face on our walk home and ditched me! That wasn’t cool, man” the brunette scolded, swatting his companions arm. Nakamura, for his part, had the decency to look ashamed. “Seriously, did you not think I was listening those times you complained about your mom and sister not trusting you with simple tasks like picking up ingredients?”
The purring stopped. Nakamura’s blush darkened again, over a very guilty expression. Averted his eyes and placed his hand on the back of his neck.
“The real reason I had to leave… it was too embarrassing to be honest about” the ravenette eventually forced out, discomfort twisting his features. I’m sorry, fighting an actual nightmare is embarrassing to you!? “It was still rude of me, you must have been so mad the rest of your walk home-“
“Stop that” Hirose ordered, which seemed to surprise the other boy. Dark eyes refocused on Aiki as he scooted closer, grabbing the taller boy by the fabric of his gakuran. “You’re lying again. You know I didn’t go home right away”
“Y-you… how could I know something like that?” Nakamura sputtered, but something different overtook his features. The redness faded, almost seeming to invert as he paled. There was some familiarity in his new expression, being panic and stress, yet they didn’t cover the look on his face accurately. “I-I didn’t see you after I left to handle that personal stuff-not until this morning”
Is that… fear?
“You’re shaking” the shorter boy realized, quickly releasing his friend. Nakamura shook his head, withdrawing into himself, arms hugging his waist defensively. God, he looked like he was about to cry. “Nakamura-“
“I’m fine!” his best friend squeaked out, hugging himself tighter as Hirose backed off. The brunnete wasn’t sure if he’d ever seen anyone so viscerally uncomfortable before. The wobbly smile Nakamura tried to plaster on for reassurance did not make this new lie any more convincing. “I’m s-s-sorry about yesterday, really! You just c-confused me with the accusatory tone. I-i-it almost sounds like you think I’m some sort of mind reader”
Why are you so scared?
“No, nothing like that…” Hirose replied, watching with a wince as his friend dug his fingers harshly into the sides of his torso. Shit-he’d pushed too far, hadn’t he? Nakamura was weirdly lenient with Hirose when it came to his usual boundaries, but this catboy-cosplay nightmare fighting thing seemed to be his hard line in the sand. If Aiki genuinely tried to continue this line of conversation, he knew it wouldn’t end well. “Can you read minds, though?”
“… No” the taller boy replied, finally looking away and pulling his legs closer to himself. His best friend was still shaking, and Hirose flinched as something knocked over his discarded bento. Wait, was it his tail? It made sense, if Nakamura was part cat now he’d still have the tail. Did he have a way to make it invisible? Did he still have the cat ears and they were invisible too-?
A quiet sniffle brought Aiki’s inquisitive thoughts to a screeching halt.
Nakamura’s trembling hadn’t stopped, bangs having fallen over his eyes. The ravenette looked smaller and more vulnerable than Hirose could remember-including when Aiki had found him in that pop-up aquarium the day they’d officially become friends. The resigned melancholy Nakamura radiated back then held no candle to the unidentified deeper, darker emotion that bled out now. A single tear ran down his best friends pale cheek, as if to tie the entire miserable sight together in a perfect, painful little bow.
Aiki promptly tossed the rest of his lunch on the ground and yanked Nakamura into a hug. The taller boy made a sort of startled squeak at the sudden contact, but Hirose ignored it in favor of repositioning his friend against himself, making sure the ravenettes chin rested on his shoulder. Once satisfied, Aiki completely wrapped his arms around the other boys form in the tightest embrace he could manage.
“I’m sorry for being so harsh” the brunette apologized quietly, feeling how tense the other boy was in his embrace. “I can tell you’re hurting, not just physically, and it’s killing me that you won’t talk about it-”
Nakamura shuddered violently, but Hirose didn’t let him go.
“S-Stop. I c-can’t” the taller boy choked out, a few hot tears dripping onto the fabric covering Hirose’s shoulder. After his weak attempt at separation, the boy then tried to curl into himself further. “P-p-please, don’t… don’t make me-“
“I’m not asking you to explain yourself. I want an explanation, but I won’t force you to talk if you’re not ready” Aiki clarified, moving one of his arms up to press his hand against the back of the other boys head. Not without hard evidence the traitorous part of his brain supplied, but right now wasn’t the time to be that honest. “Just… can let me be here for you? Even if you can’t tell me specifics, I want to support my best friend in whatever way I can. I don’t want you to be alone”
There was a beat of silence. Then, with a strangled sob, Nakamura finally reciprocated the hug, arms wrapping tight around Hirose’s torso before properly shoving his face into the brunettes shoulder to muffle further cries. Aiki’s expression softened as he began rubbing soothing circles into the other boys back, quietly whispering comforts into his ear.
The two boys ended up staying in that position well past the bell that signified the end of lunch, but Hirose couldn’t bring himself to care. Nakamura was more important, and the brunette didn’t dare suggest they return to class until the taller boy was properly done crying and fully composed himself, consequences be damned.
………..
Aiki was emotionally worn out by the time he’d gotten home. The soft, genuine smile Nakamura had given him as they’d gone their separate ways from their usual crossroads helped a bit… okay, a lot, but Hirose still had questions left unanswered and heart wrenching sobs playing as their background music. He managed to keep his act together through greeting his sister and heading upstairs, but the moment his door was shut (and locked) at his back, the teenager finally allowed himself to explode.
“FUCK!” The expletive tore itself from the boys lips as he wrenched his bag off and spiked it at a wall. The soundproofing in his home was good enough that he wouldn’t need to worry about anyone downstairs hearing the expletive headed commotion, and Aiki had never been more thankful about it than he was right then. The boys jacket and overshirt followed soon after, dropping pitifully to the floor as he stalked over to his closet and wrenched the door open. A large, long forgotten corkboard pressed against the wall by a few boxes of mementos was wrenched out of its obscurity with reckless abandon, knocking over some of its supports in the process.
Aiki ignored the rattles, kicked any excess back into the closet and forced the door to shut again.
The next twenty minutes involved equal amounts of angry disregard for personal belongings in the name of assembly, only ending when Aiki stepped back from the finished product now hung on his wall. The corkboard had been repurposed, taking a new, conspiratorial form. Three large title signs had been tacked on its surface, with many blank papers of varying sizes left on a side table to be filled in and added later, next to a bowl of accompanying pins. Two of the titles occupied each end of the board, labeled “Evidence Nakamura is a Catboy Demon(?) Fighter” and “Information on Nakamura’s Situation” respectively. The third title, being the biggest and pinned dead center at the very top, simply read “What’s Happening to My Best Friend?” The titles were just for organization purposes, and plenty of room was left for evidence and notes the brunette hoped to gather in order to paint a clear picture for himself. If he figured out enough on his own, maybe Nakamura would be more willing to open up. Hirose didn’t think he could handle the risk of making the other boy cry again, not unless he was certain the conversation would end with Nakamura finally accepting the help Aiki desperately wanted to give him. The brunette frowned, picked up the clipboard he’d tossed on his bed during the chaotic assembly, and clicked the pink octopus pen he’d been keeping safe attached to the neck of his T-shirt.
Where should I start? The incident yesterday, or with observations from lunch?
“Wow. It appears I underestimated how much you care for your friend” a vaguely familiar female voice purred from behind the teen, causing him to flinch violently and whirl around, clipboard raised in a threatening manner. The thieving cat from yesterday was sat casually atop his desk, a small smirk being the only physical indication that something was weird about the creature. Until she opened her mouth to speak again, that is. “It’s a good surprise- he’ll be needing this kind of devotion to counteract his stubborn refusal to share his burdens”
“And what would you know about Nakamura, cat?” Hirose accused inquisitively, narrowing his eyes as the mystical creature smirked at him again.
“Oh, nothing at all~” she hummed airily, tail flicking to curl at her opposite side. Aiki was becoming more tempted by the second to throw the clipboard at the animal to make her leave. “Though, I am the leading authority on everything Lucky Cat, if such things would be of interest to you”
“I don’t want to know the intricate lore behind a gimmicky legend about a beckoning calico, I need context and hard evidence for the absolute nightmare Nakamura seems to be living now” The teen snapped, jabbing his clipboard in her as if it were accentuating the point. “Hell, why am I even entertaining a conversation with you!? I almost died yesterday and it was entirely your fault!”
The cat seemed offended for a split second, before her animalistic features smoothed out into something more neutral.
“Okay, one, I don’t know how that idiot daimyo forgot my fur was black, but I will be losing my shit on the appropriate authority when I find them” the creature hissed like she’d been personally affronted, fur puffing up as anger flickered over her features once more. Yet the anger was just that- a flicker, before her fur and face smoothed themselves out again. The new expression was something more… respectful? Solemn? Something that looked very wrong on a cat. “Two, you have every right not to trust me, little one. I made a poor decision that nearly cost you your life, and for that, I owe you nothing but the sincerest of apologies”
Hirose felt a bit of the tensity in his shoulders release, as the cat then lowered the front part of her body to the ground, and pushed her head into the space where her paws pressed together.
“So, from the very depths of my soul, I’m sorry” she mewed sincerely, keeping her position for a few extra moments before she sat up again, her expression unchanged. “If you could find it in your heart, please, give me a chance to make amends. I’m the only one who can lead you to the truth you seek”
Aiki glanced back towards his freshly constructed conspiracy board. Turned to the cat. Tapped his clipboard with a finger. The cat remained steadfast and earnest.Finally, he pulled his pen back out and clicked it.
“Fine. What did you mean by “leading authority on everything Lucky Cat”, and what does that information have to do with my friend?”